Reading Scholarship

Each work of scholarship makes an original contribution to the field of music theory, in the form of a
new idea or argument. It doesn’t just apply an existing idea to a new work. Part of reading scholarship
involves identifying what’s new, even if you’re not already familiar with the work that preceded it.
Scholarly writing often follows certain conventions that can help you figure out what’s new. Typically,
authors state their main argument up front. They situate the argument with respect to the existing
literature, explaining how their idea is different. They present a new methodology: that is, a theory and
a method of applying it. Then they test the methodology through a case study, which in music theory is
usually an analysis of excerpts from one or more works. Here's our motto: “The topic of the essay is not
the topic of the essay.” The methodology is the main contribution, not the repertoire that serves as the
case study. I encourage you to describe the methodology without referring to the repertoire studied.
Let’s say we read a book on so-called “metrical dissonance” in the music of Robert Schumann. (There is
such a book, and it’s great: Fantasy Pieces, by Harald Krebs.) The methodology is a system for identifying
metrical dissonance, or conflicting layers of regularly occurring pulses. The case study is the music of
Robert Schumann. Of course, we’ll learn something about Schumann’s music from reading this book—
after all, there’s a reason that Schumann was chosen for the case study. But the methodology of
metrical dissonance can be applied to any music, not just Schumann’s. The book makes a broad
contribution to the field of music theory, beyond refining our understanding of one composer’s works.

You’ll complete this six-category note-taking template for each reading this semester. These notes will
help you refer back to each reading without having to re-read it. Compiling them will help train you to
read scholarship effectively and place it in a broader scholarly context. They’ll help you develop a skill
that I hope will be useful in your further academic work

----------------------------------------------------------------

Taking Notes

Each piece of scholarly writing advances a primary argument. Each subsection makes a mini-argument
that supports the primary argument. Use the following template to classify the largescale and small-
scale arguments in each reading. I recommend that you pause after each subsection, summarize its
mini-argument in a single sentence (in your own words), and assign it to the appropriate category
below.

Argument:

 Main
o
 Subsections - list
o

What is the author’s primary argument?

- The reading’s introduction usually presents and contextualizes the primary argument. The
remainder of the reading develops the argument in detail.
Background:

Some subsections review existing ideas or existing literature, in order to identify problems that the
author’s approach will attempt to solve.

- How will the present reading build on what’s already known?

Methodology:

A theoretical idea and method for applying it, this is the crux of the author’s contribution.

- How will the author apply and test the primary argument?
- The author might demonstrate the methodology with short analytical examples, but try to
summarize it without referring to particular works or composers.

Case study: (What are they? & What arguments do they help demonstrate?)

The reading explores implications of the methodology through extended analytical application. The case
study may focus on a single work or composer, or it may deal with several works or composers.

- What argument is made through each case study?

o You may not be familiar with the repertoire. Listen to the music, study the score and
musical examples, and read through the analysis in detail.

Conclusion:

Readings usually end by restating the primary argument and findings.

- What further implications does the author suggest for their work?

Miscellenous – Commentary, Highlights etc.:

As you work through the reading, write down any other ideas or questions that you have.
- What do you find particularly interesting or convincing or problematic?
- How does this reading relate to other scholarship you’ve read?
- How else could the methodology be applied?